Version originale anglaise complète

Bliss :Please, for the record, state your current job title and the company (ies) you work for…

Charles de Lauzirika : I’m currently a freelance DVD producer and frustrated filmmaker. I have offices at Deluxe Digital Studios, who have been kind enough to provide a roof over my head. Naturally, I have a longtime relationship with Scott Free, which continues to this day, but my services are also available to other filmmakers depending on my availability. I’ve worked with almost all of the major studios now and currently enjoy continuing business relationships with many of them. My core staff consists of about three people but depending on the workload, that number could easily go up depending on the workload. For Spider-Man 2, I had four editors, a coordinator, an associate producer and a couple of production assistants. For Alien Quadrilogy, I had even larger team, but of course, it was a much larger project, over a much longer period of time.

Bliss :Alien Quadrilogy had some of the most complete bonus of all time, so does Black Hawk Down, and the Bonus material on Spider-Man 2 are supposed to total 10 hours (audio commentaries included I suppose)… How come your projects become so enormous ? Is it something you decide up front ? Or your way of digging so deep for material, that you come up with so much ? No question about it that you’re looking for quality but still you end up with both quality and quantity that puts any other projects to shame. Is it in your nature to work all the way or a conscious decision ?

Charles de Lauzirika : I simply don’t believe in intentionally creating incomplete or superficial content. Sometimes you have no choice, for legal reasons, for marketing reasons or because certain material is lost or unavailable. But I always try to load my discs up with as much quality material as I can. It’s not always possible but I never want to create a disc that leaves people begging for a double-dip. Ultimately, I just try to make discs that I myself would want to own, so that makes understanding my process very easy to grasp.

Bliss :So much material to gather must cost a lot of money and time to the production… How do you obtain their agreement to such a huge commitment? The Spider-Man 2 DVD would sell great without so much work (and money) anyway, how do you convince the production ?

Charles de Lauzirika :Well, apparently I’ve recently gained a reputation in the DVD industry for being expensive, or only taking on big budget projects. That’s certainly not my intention. A big film deserves a big DVD, and a big DVD simply costs big money. I’ve done plenty of smaller discs for ridiculously meager budgets as well. The variables are always different. Having said that, the large scope of the Spider-Man 2 DVD wasn’t a tough sell for Sony. It’s their biggest film of the year and they wanted a big, impressive special edition that not only satisfied fans but also silenced all the critics of the first Spider-Man DVD, which I was not involved with. But you’re right, Spider-Man 2 would be a huge seller even if you didn’t put any supplements on it. But I don’t think the fans would have been particularly happy about it.

Bliss :For Alien your work was one of research, but did you start working up front to make the Spider-Man 2 DVD ? How much were you able to decide and ask for before or during principal photography ?

Charles de Lauzirika : I was approached by Sony to produce the Spider-Man 2 DVD long before photography began. But because of the very tight security on this project, I really had to beg and plead for every scrap I could get a long the way. Fortunately, Avi Arad and Kevin Feige at Marvel were incredibly supportive from the very beginning, so thanks to their enthusiasm, I was able to shoot the multi-angle « Enter The Web » featurette while the film was still in production. Beyond that, most of my work took place after the film wrapped. I’ve been luckier on Ridley Scott projects, as you can see in the documentary for Matchstick Men. He gave me total access from the very beginning, and the result is an extremely rare glimpse into the creative process of a master filmmaker. I find that material to be far more insightful than the promotional interviews I sometimes have to use to cobble together featurettes.

Bliss :You rightfully despise the promotional documentaries we see on too many DVD, so how did you avoid it on the Spider-Man 2 DVD (if you did avoid it) ?

Charles de Lauzirika : I’m not sure if we avoided it or not. Not entirely, anyway. I mean, it’s certainly less promotional and fluffy than a lot of featurettes for new films on other DVDs, but it’s still not as immersive as I would have hoped. At least I was allowed to cover a lot of different kinds of material this time. See, that’s the problem. For new blockbuster films, there are a lot of politics involved. A lot of control issues. The DVD supplements are sometimes seen more as a marketing tool than as a meaningful archive of substantive material. Being a new movie, they are still trying to sell the film, rather than trying to shed light on the hard work that went into it. Again, I’ve gotten lucky on some new films, but I find it much easier to put together quality supplements on older films that don’t have the full attention of the filmmakers. I hate saying that, but that’s just the way it is sometimes.

Bliss :What was the most unusual/hard to do bonus you succeeded on this Spider-Man 2 DVD ?

Charles de Lauzirika : I’ve always wanted to do a multi-angle on-set featurette that allowed viewers to see what it was really like to set up a shot. How much time it takes, how many decisions have to be made, all for a few seconds of film. I had never seen it done before quite like this. I’ve seen some multi-angle behind-the-scenes material on other discs that fake the « real-time » experience, but I wanted to make it as real as possible for the viewer, to put them in the moment. So « Enter The Web » was born. It’s not perfect, but it’s a good start. I’ll make it even better next time.

Bliss :Even with this huge projects, are there still some ideas and materials that didn’t make the DVD, and why ?

Charles de Lauzirika : Well, obviously there are no deleted scenes, but that’s enitrely the filmmaker’s decision. There has already been plenty of talk about Spider-Man 2.5, so we’ll have to see what happens with that. Otherwise, most of what I wanted to include on the disc is there. It’s just the tone and substance is not exactly what I had in mind. But it’s still pretty damn good, considering.

Bliss :What’s the last update on the Blade Runner DVD project ?

Charles de Lauzirika : As far as I know, its status hasn’t changed. There hasn’t been a lot of activity on it in the last couple of years. But hopefully, one day soon, things will get cleared up and we’ll be able to proceed. It’s a shame the fans are being deprived like this. To paraphrase Roy Batty, « If only they could see what I have seen with their eyes. » There’s some truly fantastic material to explore.

Bliss :On what DVDs are you working now ?

Charles de Lauzirika : The big one I’m working on right now is Kingdom of Heaven, Ridley Scott’s new crusades epic. It’s a massive film and likewise, the DVD is a very ambitious undertaking. I’m also working on Domino for Tony Scott, Tristan & Isolde for Kevin Reynolds, and a few others I can’t talk about yet. Mostly, I’m just trying to get my own film made. I’ve got a script I’m very happy with and I’m hoping to be shooting by this time next year.

Bliss :Once the job done without him, what did Fincher said about your Alien 3 cut on Alien Quadrilogy ? Did you work on any of his past DVD ? Will you ?

Charles de Lauzirika : I haven’t had any direct contact with Fincher and have absolutely no idea what he thinks of the Alien 3 Special Edition. He disowned the film and I disowned the DVD, so I’m not sure there’s a lot to talk about. I would love to produce the DVD for a film he’s truly proud of. He’s an exceptionally gifted filmmaker and it’s a shame that my one chance to produce a DVD for one of his films was the one he had no interest in. But I’m still happy to have been the first DVD producer to create a in-depth, longform documentary on one of Fincher’s films.